Going for the lift
by Amie357
Summary: One shot. Set within the episode 'Katie'. A bit of a what-if scenario that was rattling round my head. What if Katie turned up? Drinking games and hilarity ensues, with a healthy dose of Ness :) Hope you enjoy!


"Are you Katie?" The tall, handsome stranger looked at Jess, smiling dashingly. She was on the verge of going with it, when a tiny, dark haired woman across the other side of the bar piped up.

"Sam? It's me, Katie!"

With that, Sam disappeared without even casting so much as a glance towards Jess. Nick could see from across the bar that Jess was disappointed. She looked like she needed the distraction of a little excitement. Nick took Jess a drink and gave her a smile as he set it down in front of her.

"Thanks Nick," she said glumly. "Being drunk in the middle of the day is weird."

Nick chuckled at his friend. He'd been drunk in the middle of the day on more than one occasion over the years and it was incredibly strange.

"You feel like the drunkest person in the world," Nick agreed, before leaning in conspiratorially. "You just need to get to the right kind of drunk - the invincible, take on the world kinda place."

"And how, Nick Miller, does a lady do that exactly?"

Nick gave a confident raise of his eyebrow. This was his area of expertise and he simply loved the way Jess hung on every word that he said when she'd had a few drinks. It was absolutely adorable.

"It's all about what you drink," he told her with a nod. "It's never how much."

"So what do I do to get invincible? It sounds like I need a shot of gamma rays or something."

"That's the tricky part. Each person has a slightly different reaction."

"Like what?"

"Gin's a good example," he told her sagely. "Most girls drink it and it makes them cry about how nobody likes their shoes. I drink it and I am a god. I can play pool like a legend, women give me their numbers, it's like magic. I don't drink it often as I don't want to waste its powers.

Jess giggled and twirled a long curly lock of hair around her finger indicating that Nick should continue.

"I don't drink dark rum," he said with a shake of his head.

"Why not? What does that do?"

"Oh, I'm a damn nightmare on dark rum." He leaned over to whisper in her ear, sending a thrill up her spine at his closeness that she studiously ignored. "It makes me, like, mad horny. Full of mischief and just general naughtiness."

He leaned back to look her in the eye. He shook her a daring wink and she giggled into her drink coyly.

"So what's your invincible drink?" she asked softly.

"It's really embarrassing," he said, looking at his feet.

"Spill it, Miller," she demanded.

"Fine. My invincible drink is Schnapps. It doesn't matter what the flavor is, just so long as it's a fruity one. Happy?"

Jess threw her head back and laughed throatily. "And you say Winston gets weird with fruity drinks!"

"How do you think we discovered that he gets weird? We drank a whole bunch of it, thinking we'd both go to the superhero stage, but he just got weird."

"Fruit me, Miller," Jess cried, still laughing. "I want to see what it does to me!"

Jess drank her way through various fruity concoctions throughout the rest of Nick's shift. Luckily he had a daytime shift and finished at around dinner time. Jess looked like she was far from invincible and Nick mused that he felt like the most sober person in the universe.

"Niiiiiiiii-ick," Jess whined, grabbing his arm as they left the bar, blinking at the bright evening sunshine after spending so long in the darkened bar. "Let's go get some drinks. You've been drinking water all day so you've got some catching up to do."

"I think you've had enough for today," Nick said, trying to keep his voice as kind and gentle as he could. She usually liked that.

"Nope!"

Giggling manically, she ran off, heading towards the only liquor store that she knew. Nick shook his head and mentally chided himself for encouraging his friend to get drunk. He ran after her, hoping that she wasn't getting weird like Winston.

He stopped as she bounced out of the liquor store, brandishing a bag of bottles at him.

"Can we please stop running, Jess," Nick panted. "I'm too damn unfit for this crap."

"Where shall we go, Nick?"

Her eyes bored into him in a way that made him more than a little uncomfortable. Sometimes he had no idea what was going through her head. He knew that she had been knocked for a loop by suddenly losing her job, but this seemed like it was something else.

"I think maybe we should go home and order a pizza," he suggested. He hoped that through a combination of food and familiar surroundings, she would either sober up or fall asleep. Although, he mused, if not at least she'd be somewhere safe that he could look after her.

She nodded and trotted off quickly, grabbing his hand and dragging him along behind her. They made it home quickly and went upstairs, finding an empty apartment. There was a note from Schmidt and Winston explaining that they were both out for the night and would be back the following day.

"Just us then," Nick said, suddenly feeling nervous. He hadn't planned on being alone around drunk and unpredictable Jess.

"Jessica Day and Nick Miller," Jess sang, "aloooone in their loft, fighting crime and being invincible!"

Nick chuckled in spite of himself. "What crime are we fighting, precisely?"

"Ummmmmmm," Jess hummed musically. "The crime of Nick being too sober and Jess being too hungry!"

Nick picked up the phone and ordered a pizza, not taking his eyes off Jess.

"The plucky hero begins to solve one crime," Jess narrated, grinning. "The courageous and beautiful heroine solved the other!" She pulled four bottles of booze out of her carrier back and put them on the coffee table. She flopped down unceremoniously.

"That's teamwork for ya," Nick muttered, still not entirely convinced that he should be playing along with her. For some reason it felt like playing with fire. He grabbed two glasses on the way to join Jess on the sofa.

"My hero!" Jess said, chortling at her own joke. It seemed that she was really running with the invincible superhero bit.

"So what did you get us, Jess?" Nick asked, leaning forward to look at the labels on the bottles.

"I got three flavors of Schnapps," she said, pulling up the bottles in turn to show him. "Peach, apple and cinnamon to mix things up a bit."

"And the fourth one?" He could read the label and it made his heart pound in his chest.

"Dark rum," she said with a smile. It felt to Nick like the atmosphere had been sucked out of the room.

"Is that for you or for me?" he asked raggedly.

"We'll just have to see what happens, Miller," Jess replied enigmatically.

Nick's heart pounded. He wasn't sure what was happening. He was pretty sure that Jess was flirting with him, but he didn't know if that was just the fruit talking. He wasn't entirely sure that the dark rum would actually do anything to him with her in the room - she was like his human dark rum. Not that he'd admit that to anyone.

"Feeling invincible yet?" Nick asked, his voice still a little strange, but he was feeling keen to distract himself from the palpable sexual tension in the room.

"Not really," Jess said, wrinkling her brow in thought. "I feel like I want to run around screaming, to be honest!"

"That's how I always start off with the dark rum," Nick said, suddenly worried. "Then a few more shots and I'm... well... I'm in big trouble."

In response, Jess gave him a mischievous wink and drank a shot of the apple schnapps. Wordlessly, she opened the rum and poured him a shot. She looked him in the eye as she poured herself another schnapps.

"Do you want to get crazy, Miller?" she asked, a hint of danger in her voice.

He had been pushing thoughts of Jess out of his mind for quite some time now. He had flip-flopped between thinking that she had the same thoughts as him and that he was seriously inside the friend zone. She was a very confusing woman.

"Let's not get too crazy, Jess," Nick said with a gentle smile. "I don't want you to do something or start something we'll both regret."

"What are you worried about, Nick?"

He didn't want to talk about it, so he decided to just throw his drink down his throat and try to keep it all at bay until the damn pizza got there to sober her up.

Jess giggled and poured. She leaped out of her seat and skipped over to her DVDs. She grabbed Dirty Dancing and skipped to the player, jamming it in and hastily hitting play.

"Dirty Dancing drinking game!" Jess squealed. Nick groaned.

"What are the rules? And don't think I don't know that you're using it as an excuse to make me watch this terrible damn movie."

"Come on, Nick," Jess pleaded softly. "Movie for me, drinks for you. This could be fun for the crime fighting duo!"

"Fine!" Nick agreed grumpily. He shot her a turtle face, but decided, for reasons that escaped him, to go along with her.

Jess gave a small cheer and gave him the rules of the game. She told him to drink when he saw a cardigan, line dancing, Baby dancing by herself or dancing badly. The list went on.

"We should switch to beer with that many rules," Nick said sensibly. "We'd be hammered in five minutes! You're already pretty gone, Jess."

"Ok, ok," she conceded. "How about a drink for the first three, then penalties for the rest?"

"Like what?" he asked, intrigued.

"So, instead of a shot every time they try the lift, we try the lift instead." She giggled at the mental image of the two of them falling over.

"And instead of a shot every time Baby says 'Daddy'," Nick tried, "we go put on something of Schmidt's."

"Oooh, exactly!" Jess enthused. "Whenever Baby gets tickled, we get tickled!"

They ran through the rest, hoping that they'd remember long enough to do them all. The FBI warnings on the DVD had finally finished and the movie started. Within minutes, the two of them were giggling like idiots, doing several shots.

"Daddy!" they shouted, running to Schmidt's room and grabbing a tie each, giggling like maniacs.

They paused the movie when the pizza came and ate quickly, eager to get back to the game. Nick's initial misgivings had started to dispel as this seemed like it was just a fun drinking game between two friends.

Hitting play, almost instantly they shouted, "Daddy!"

They crashed into each other as they ran to Schmidt's room. Nick put on Schmidt's summer suit jacket with the lightning bolt. Jess put on his kimono, which Nick couldn't help but admire on her.

As the characters on screen ran towards each other, about to fail at doing the famous lift, Nick ran towards Jess. She laughed hysterically at him pretending that she was going to be able to lift him.

The next time they were about to try the lift, Jess gave Nick a serious look and ran full pelt towards him. Nick knew he didn't quite have the upper body strength to pull off the move, but with rum running through his veins he thought he'd give it a try. Jess leaped into the air, grinning with delight.

Nick grabbed her firmly in his hands and lifted her up. He thought for a fleeting second that he might actually do it, but as soon as that thought entered his head, he overbalanced and came crashing down in a tangle of limbs with his friend. They both giggled, slightly uncontrollably.

She made no move to get up. He looked at her, not quite what to do and not quite sure what to feel about her being on top of him. She wiggled on top of him and his breath caught in his throat.

"That was hilarious," Jess said, her face a little closer to his than it would normally be. He could feel her breath and smell the unmistakeable fruitiness of the apple schnapps riding on it.

"We almost managed it," Nick managed to choke out, hoping his voice was less shaky than he felt it was.

"Let's try again!" Jess said, suddenly leaping up from laying on him. He felt a quick pang of sadness at her going.

Nick shook his head and got up. He bent his knees and put his hands out, showing her that he was game. Jess ran towards him, going so fast that she felt like her legs were whirling faster than was possible. He grabbed her waist and thrust her up in the air.

"It worked!" she shrieked. "Nick, Nick, it worked!"

"I can't believe it worked!" Nick agreed.

He spun round in a circle, lowering her gently into his arms. He thought to himself dimly that it was like a damn fairytale. How could a crazy moment in a drinking game be like a damn fairytale?

Jess looked into his eyes, her feet still not on the floor and her arms now flung around Nick's neck. She started to move her head towards his, her breathing slightly ragged. He moved towards her, his eyes flicking to her lips and back up to her eyes, not quite believing what was just about to happen.

Jess gasped suddenly, her eyes widening. With that, she put her hands either side of his head and pulled him roughly towards her. She kissed him hard, feeling sparks explode through their kiss. Nick felt his knees almost buckle, one arm around her waist, pulling her in as close as he could, the other going up her back to put his hand in her flowing curls.

She pulled away from him and shot him a smile.

"It felt like we should kiss," she offered simply. "We were like a movie for a minute there."

Nick didn't trust his voice, so he just put her back down on the ground. They didn't let go of each other just yet. He was looking into her sparkling blue eyes as she gazed unwavering into his dark eyes. The electricity between them crackled in the air. They both took in ragged breaths.

"Daddy!" they yelled in unison, holding hands as they ran to Schmidt's room. They were both a little glad that the moment had ended like this. Nick couldn't help but feel the danger in their level of attraction towards each other.

They ran back to the TV, Nick wearing Schmidt's driving moccasins and Jess wearing one of Schmidt's wallet chains as a necklace. They flopped back on the couch, sinking a shot each with a giggle.

Jess's stomach filled with butterflies. She had seen this movie so many times that she knew what was going to happen in the next scene. They watched as Baby and Johnny practiced their dance. His hands ran down the underside of her arm and she started to giggle as it tickled her.

Nick's head snapped up and he looked at Jess expectantly. He could see something that looked like nervousness on her face. He swallowed at the sudden lump in his throat. Jess started to smile, trying to valiantly wipe the nerves from her expression.

She dived over and tickled him mercilessly. He giggled in a more girly fashion than he had intended and retaliated, tickling her back. Neither of them knew when they had started kissing, but it had just happened. This time, instead of the romantically lingering kiss, they were pressing into each other frantically. Their hands were all over each other, their panting breaths and low moans driving each other crazy.

They kissed hungrily until the movie ended, lost in the incredible moment. As the music over the ending credits came to a close, they moved their mouths apart and each drew a shaky breath.

"I'm sorry," Nick muttered.

"What on earth for?" Jess looked genuinely confused.

"I shouldn't have gotten you drunk, Jess," he said softly, still holding her gaze.

"You didn't get me drunk, Nick," Jess said with a gentle smile. "I got me tipsy. You helped me to have a fantastic evening and a brilliant game with a friend."

The word friend hung in the air like smoke between them. Nick couldn't help but feel a little bit disappointed. He had thought that the kissing and the sparks between them might have meant that they were a little more than friends.

Jess spotted the smile disappear from his eyes. She knew exactly why. As soon as she had said the word, she wanted to grab it and cram it back into her mouth somehow. She desperately wanted to make it better and put the smile back in his eyes.

"You also helped me to find some new outfits," she pointed to the mismatch of Schmidt's clothes that she was wearing. Nick laughed softly and looked away from her.

Jess's heart started to pound.

"Nice 'mono," he murmured gruffly.

"And most of all," she told him, gently pulling his chin up with her finger so that he had no choice but to look her in the eyes. "Most of all, you helped me realize that I have a major crush on my roommate."

Nick's heart stopped. His mouth drew a shocked 'o'. Time stood still for a moment as he registered what she had said.

"Major?" he asked, his voice cracking slightly.

"Pretty major, yeah," she said, a distinct redness creeping into her cheeks.

"Is she hot?" he asked, trying to make a joke to avoid having to tell her how he felt.

Jess laughed softly. "He's a he," she told him with a wry smile. "And yeah, smokin' hot."

"Smokin' hot?" His eyebrows almost jumped off the top of his head in surprise.

"Smokin' hot," she confirmed. "If only I knew whether he liked me back." She looked bold but insecure. She was a study in contrasts.

"If only," he teased, stroking her cheek gently with his thumb.

"Nick," she said softly, a plea in her voice. That melted his heart enough to give him a little boldness.

"I happen to know your roommate," he told her gruffly. "He tells me that he thinks you're pretty hot yourself. In fact, he's had a crush on you since the day you moved in. He didn't always realize it, but it's always been there."

She smiled and looked into his crinkly, dark eyes. He smiled back at her and gave her a peck on the lips.

"Let's try that lift again," he said with mischief sparkling in his eyes.

Jess leaped up and ran across the room and charged towards him, not knowing what would happen but needing to run to him nonetheless.


End file.
